SAN JOSE, Calif. – This time, there wasn’t enough time for the San Jose Earthquakes to overcome their slow start in the US Open Cup.
Two weeks ago, San Jose spotted USL side Sacramento Republic a sixth-minute goal and another in the 54th before scoring twice late through Chris Wondolowski to force a penalty-kick shootout they eventually won 6-5.
That put the Quakes into the Round of 16 against the archrivals LA Galaxy, who struck Wednesday with the same quickness – barely a half-dozen minutes into the contest – but made that one Jose Villarreal goal count in a 1-0 defeat for San Jose.
“That’s the one thing I said to the guys tonight was, ‘Start the game slow, you get punished for it, and now you’re chasing the game,’” Kinnear told reporters after the match. “It doesn’t matter how many chances you get, or if you think you’re the better team; you need to start the game off correctly. I thought we might have learned our lesson with our game against Sacramento, because that was the same thing that happened. Obviously, we’re playing a better team [in the Galaxy]. Even though we worked hard and got ourselves in front of goal and got ourselves some chances, it’s the start that comes back to haunt us.”
San Jose were never able to break through against LA goalkeeper Brian Rowe, despite outshooting the visitors 14-7 for the game, 9-2 in the second half, and taking all nine corner kicks on the evening.
“I don’t know what it is, why we came out so slow,” midfielder Khari Stephenson said. “All the guys were motivated, ready to go. It’s a lot of guys, including myself, who aren’t getting a lot of minutes in league. We all have a lot to prove, and for some reason, two games in a row, we come out flat and we come out slow and we get punished. It’s very frustrating. But that’s how the game is sometimes. Things don’t always go according to plan.”
The Quakes generated more chances in the second half, playing a more direct style – a diamond 4-4-2 with Mike Fucito coming on at intermission to join Mark Sherrod up top – in hopes of finding a goal.
But without Wondolowski, who is with the US national team preparing for CONCACAF Gold Cup play this month, to provide late-game magic, the attack fizzled into a few near-misses that left the crowd oohing and aahing.
“[An equalizer] was definitely coming,” said Sherrod, who found the net in the 30th minute but was ruled offside. “It was definitely within arm’s length.”
To Kinnear, however, all the pretty buildup and chances generated did not amount to anything but a third straight season getting knocked out without reaching the Open Cup quarterfinals. The Galaxy ended up beating San Jose for the fifth time without a loss in USOC play.
“It’s not just games to go out and play well,” Kinnear explained. “I said it to the team in there: ‘I want guys who want to play well, but also guys who want to win.’ I think we started the game with a team [whose] mentality was just to play well. I think we need to start off the game with, ‘I want to win this game’ from the first minute.”
